Letters: "Chickens that forage for food may be the healthier bet" and more

For more than 30 years, I have kept a variety of heritage-breed laying hens and provided my extended family and dozens of friends and neighbors with real farm eggs. Many of us enjoy eating these eggs poached, “sunny side up” and other traditional ways which the experts now prefer to call “undercooked.”

My chickens have constant access to conventional “store-bought” layer feed. However, they also forage around the barnyard, scratching in the soil, the compost pile and the grass for the wonderful and mysterious tidbits that make a farmstead egg so much more colorful, healthy and tasty than bland eggs from industrial sources. I must confess that they even scratch through the horse manure, and (horrors!) eat the undigested grains they may find therein.

In a recent article in the Gazette, the “experts” assured readers that the recent salmonella outbreak is not a consequence of factory farming; i.e., keeping a million or so industrial-breed hens confined indoors in one location. They tell us we should be afraid, very afraid, of any egg, from any source, that has not been cooked hard.

It is possible that all of us who have eaten eggs from my farm all these years are just plain lucky we haven’t taken ill due to our “undercooked” ways. Or, maybe, just maybe, pastured hens have healthier immune systems than do their inbred, confined, stressed and debeaked sisters.

A robust immune system requires that an animal have both an inborn genetic capability and the opportunity to develop that genetic potential.

Maybe the hens bred for extreme industrial egg-laying capabilities have lost, along with longevity, foraging instincts and the ability to reproduce themselves, the genetic ability to develop a healthy immune system. Maybe a heritage-breed hen that scratches in a healthy soil teeming with microbes develops an immune system that is better equipped to ward off colonization by salmonella.

It would be wonderful to see our taxpayer-supported colleges of agriculture conduct serious research on such questions. Some of the answers, however, might just prove embarrassing to the proponents of industrial agriculture.

Marcia V. Stucki/Cedar Hill Farm, Galesburg

Injured pit bull puppy not only animal in need of a loving home

I was not surprised to read that so many people were interested in adopting that adorable, abused pit bull puppy. I’m certain he will find a permanent loving home.

To those who are not lucky enough to take him home, please remember there are just as many unfortunate dogs and cats at local animal control shelters, humane societies and rescue groups that would be so grateful for a permanent loving home, too.Barb Himebaugh/Gobles